The Effect of Brand Position on Consumer Choices of Luxury Brands: A Cross-Cultural Study Between British and Chinese Consumers

Qi GUO, Dandan LI

Abstract

This dissertation is grouped by topics—luxury brands, values, consumer luxury shopping behaviour, luxury brand management, and luxury brand differentiations. It intends to address the influence of luxury brand positioning on consumer choices.Despite various changes in internal and external environment, little research has investigated the differences of Chinese and British luxury markets. Therefore, in this article, an approach to understanding the positioning of luxury brands and luxury consumption behaviour is presented. The existing definitions are reviewed, which suggests that consumer consumption decisions of luxury brands can be evaluated by 39 items models. Based on this, the purpose of this paper is to focus on and to offer a deeper understanding of the luxury brand positioning effects. In order to fulfil this purpose, four research objectives and three propositions are expounded focusing on the variables of consumer choice decision as well as an explanation of the brand unique personality. By following the research objectives and propositions as a direction guide, literature studies are critically analysed resulting in a composite framework which guides the data interpretation. This research takes a qualitative case study for collecting secondary data by means of previous research data. The analysed results demonstrate that there would be a difference in the effect of brand positioning between the Chinese and British consumers. By identifying the equity of different luxury brands, consumer choice behaviour can be better understood, and this may assist luxury brand managers in their exploration of luxury market.